The greatest strength of Leonie Forbes as an actress was her incredible dramatic range to become “all things to all people” in her different character portrayals.

Leonie became each fictional persona by transforming herself not just physically but in the intellectual interpretation of each role she played. Leonie did not act, she became, full stop. For a director, she was like clay on a potter’s wheel.

In my movie Children of Babylon, she stole the show while never saying one word as Dorcas the dumb housekeeper. Such was her ability to translate love, passion, and pain, which for many, was her motion picture tour-de-force.

Professionalism par excellence plus humility and kindness were her trademarks. Leonie is the only performer who always volunteered to source her own costumes and props without financial reward. She did this without fanfare or seeking praise.

To pass time between scenes, she would sit quietly doing her crochet while volunteering to help the other actors with the interpretation of their roles and delivery of their lines.

Despite her international acting footprint in theatre, television and movies, for Leonie, no role was too small. When l offered her small, secondary roles in the movies Glory to Gloriana and Family Affair she was just as excited and committed as when it was a marquee billing.

In the docu-drama Hope Deferred she played the grandmother who trafficked her own granddaughter for a wad of money from a rich businessman. She advised me that the role would be more poignant if she sat silently outside in her rocking chair while the gruesome sex act took place in her own bedroom. This was a ready-made tearjerker.

It was fun and games in TRAXX, the television comedy with the star power of Leonie, Oliver Samuels, and Volier Johnson. She was the resident foil for the constant jousting between the two men. Impeccable timing as a comedic actress was more evidence that she was as good as the best in the business albeit in another genre.

Written encomiums cannot do justice to this giant who towered above her peers and was always ready to do another take to make the scene better. Her footprints will remain etched in granite among the best actors the Caribbean has known. I am the richer today for having worked with her.

Leonie will always be my shining star.